Top Takeaways from Content Marketing World 2014? Creation, Marketing, Amplification

By Katie Kennedy, Business Wire Cleveland

Last week we had the opportunity to attend Content Marketing World, hosted by Joe Pulizzi and the Content Marketing Institute. CMI brought over 2,600 marketing professionals from around the world to Cleveland, Ohio, to discuss a topic near and dear to Business Wire’s clients: content – how to create it, how to market it and how to amplify it. After having the time to absorb and reflect on the sessions and review my many, many pages of notes, I wanted to share a few of top takeaways from the event:

Andrew Davis, Author, Brandscaping: Unleashing the Power of Partnerships:
Davis kicked off the show with an engaging keynote, “Inspired Content: How Brilliant Storytellers Create a Sudden Urge to Act,” urging marketers to rethink the marketing funnel and focus on what he calls “moments of inspiration.”

“Valuable content increases the demand for the products and services you sell,” said Davis. “If you want to own the consumer journey, create moments of inspiration. MOI leads to ROI.”

Julie Fleischer, Director, Data + Content + Media, Kraft Foods:
The theme of Fleischer’s keynote, “The ROI of Content: How Kraft Learned the True Value of Its Content and Rebuilt Its Marketing Around It,” can be summed up in three words: relentlessly pursue worthiness.

“Efficiency must be baked in. Content and data should be inexplicably linked,” said Fleischer. Kraft’s strategy focuses on maximizing the uses for any given piece of content and only producing content that they feel is worthy of the budget.

Steve Rotter, Global VP of Digital Marketing Solutions, Brightcove:
Rotter shared several very compelling statistics to stress the growing importance of using videos in your content marketing strategy in his session, “How to Drive Engagement in a World of Content Overload.”

The use of video is growing faster than any other type of content marketing because:

Video reduces page bounce by 12%

Video landing pages increase conversion rate by 75%

Consumers are 88% more likely to buy after watching a video product review

Rotter also reminded the audience that 70% of the time content is your first sales call. Stellar content can start the sales process before you pick up the phone or continue the conversation with prospects you’ve already touched. So why is it that up to 70% of B2B content never gets used?

Mark Schaefer, Author, Return on Influence & The Tao of Twitter:
“We build relationships with brands just as we do with people,” said Schaefer in his session outlining “10 Reasons Twitter is Content Marketing’s Best Friend.”

To make the most of Twitter as part of your content marketing strategy, you need to be in the social media mindset and create meaningful content, make targeted connections and provide authentic helpfulness. Contribute to the conversation in a meaningful way that provides value. “Everyone can tell when you’re just trying to sell something,” said Schaefer.

Twitter is an ignition point. Twitter offers the fastest way to build an audience of relevant followers for your content and smart interaction on Twitter will lead people to your content.

Twitter is a source of content. We already know news breaks on Twitter, but it also provides a steady stream of content ideas and access to the web’s best teachers.

Tweets are powerful social proof on the internet. Using Twitter to build a relevant audience can ignite your content and produce rewards in the form of social validation and SEO benefits.

Beyond Storytelling

CMW embraced its overall theme and not only taught us how to harness emotion to tell a great story with content, but also focused on strategy and how content marketing can be successfully integrated into our organizations. For more highlights and event recaps from CMW attendees: